Subsurface Circular
Worth it · Narrative · 2017
Steam Deck PlayableThe verdict
BUY IT.
Worth it at $5.99, a BANGER if it drops to $4.76.
- Length
- 2h
- Value
- $3.00/hr
- Reviews
- 94% positive
Watch this gameOne alert when it is worth buying.
Minimum on the Steam store: 8 GB of memory, Dedicated 2048 MB+, 1 GB of storage. Runs on Windows, macOS.
When the truth is buried, go underground. Step into this new take on text-based adventure from the award-winning team behind Thomas Was Alone and Volume. A short story that hands you the fate of the world above, as a detective looking for answers on the Subsurface Circular.
What drives the score
How to read this
Grades run S to D, read from the buyer's side. ▲ marks a lift, ▼ a drag or a dock, ? an input we do not have, • a fact this genre's score does not use. How the grades work
The value story
It has never been cheaper than $1.19. That was June 2022. 68 discounts in the 9 years on record. They run about 20 percent off, roughly 5 weeks apart. It becomes a BANGER at $4.76, a level the record has reached 31 times.
Against its own genre it lands in the top 1 percent on value. It is better reviewed than 96 percent of its genre. Among the games that feel like it, Pentiment ($9.99, scores 92) beats it on value, while it beats Lacuna – A Sci-Fi Noir Adventure ($15.99, scores 53).
The press gave it 83; the people who bought it give it 94 percent. An 11-point gap in the buyer's favour.
This site sampled 327 of its Steam-purchase reviews; none were written by buyers who refunded it, sampled from reviews written January 2021 to August 2026. Inside the two-hour refund window, 93 percent of the 319 reviews written there were positive, against 94 percent overall, and those are 21 percent of everything written about it.
The drop-off
87% start to 20% rarestNo achievement in this game marks the ending, so there is no finish rate. The curve runs from the most-unlocked achievement to the rarest, and its shape is where players stop. Steam global achievements
What players say
🎮 Personal Review Tiers 1 - Exceptional | 2 - Great | 3 - Good | 4 - Average | 5 - Bad Subsurface Circular Review Tier: 2 - Great 📌 Disclaimer This review reflects my experience playing exclusively on Xbox Ally X. ✅ Pros - An engaging Orwellian sci-fi mystery with consistently well-written dialogue. - Designed to be completed in a single sitting, making excellent use of the player's time. - Exceptionally realised...
I've been fascinated by short, experimental games lately. Nowadays, the art of gaming demands more and more of your time: sprawling RPGs with quests in every nook and cranny, live-service games with battle passes beckoning you to their depths. More ephemeral, lunch-break titles, in this case, Mike Bithell's Subsurface Circular, developed by Bithell Games, serve to captivate instantly while serving as a somewhat...
It's a pretty good reading. Ending is okayish. Feels like a short story or a pilot for TV series set in one location. Somehow it's quite calm and soothing to just ride metro. Very small text on steam deck ;/
Steam reviews, mixed to match its Steam ratio and rotated daily. Opinions are theirs.
Cite this score
Subsurface Circular scores 81/100 on the BANG Score (worth it) as of Oct 2, 2026. The BANG Score rates what a game is worth for the money. Via Steam BANGERS. https://steambangers.com/game/676820/subsurface-circularReviews set the ceiling, and price against real length moves the BANG Score inside it. How it works, and where it is weak → Steam reviews as of Sep 26, price as of Oct 1.
A number here look wrong? Tell me and I will check the inputs.